(Closed) Puppy pees around the pad! Help!

I need a little bit of advice! So I am trying to train a 9 weeks old pomeranian puppy to use pee pads (we live on the 3rd story of an apartment building so it’s hard trying to train him outside especially bc his bladder is so small). And his pees are really small. He keeps peeing next to or around the pad but will usually poo on the pad most of the time. We will eventually transition him to outside when he can hold it longer ( he pees about every 20-30 mins right now). What do I do when he pees around the pad? I put him ontop of the pad right after he pees but he runs right off and wants to play. We crate him overnights and he does really well. No accidents, and we crate him when we leave the house. Also, should we be crating him when neither of us can give him attention? My fiancé works from home so we just have the kitchen blocked off and leave him in there. (we crate him when neither of us are home). Am I expecting too much of him at this age? We have had him for about a week now.

I know this really isn’t what you want to hear, but you really should be taking him outside every half hour to every hour. Dogs can usually control their bladder one hour for every month of life, but this is not a surefire calculation. He needs routine, and puppy pads do not establish a routine.

His crate is his den. He won’t pee in his den unless it’s an emergency because that’s where he sleeps. It’s a sanctuary, a place that is his and he won’t spoil it unless he absolutely must. Never must you make the den a negative environment (Punishment, ignoring him, etc) because you want him to get warm fuzzy feelings about his den. I would suggest putting him in the crate for short periods of time if you cannot observe him, but puppies are a lot like toddlers. You never leave them unattended or unwatched. Especially if they’re not potty trained.

When my dog was being trained, every single time I took him outside, I would sit him by the front door, point to the front door and tell him to touch. When he touched it with his nose, he got a treat. When he went outside and pee’d or poop’d, he got a treat. He now associates touching the door with going outside. It really isn’t a difficult thing to teach them, most dogs will pick it up in a week or two. Everyone in my family & my friends know that if Orion touches the back door, he needs to go out. Your puppy isn’t too young to learn this. Maybe a possibility?

Pee pads are designed to be used in play pens in case of an accident (You’re supposed to litter the floor with them in their play areas) but they are expensive and they’re very counterproductive. You want the dog to learn to do his business outside, but what you’re telling him with the pads (and putting him on it every time) is that it’s also okay to do his business in the house.

@Jav4491: Take him out as often as you need to. If it’s an inconvenience to you, you should seriously rethink things. Imagine when your poor pup gets into something bad and has diarrhea every 15 minutes for 6 hours in the middle of the night. Are you going to make him poop on a pad because it’s too cold out and you’re scared of getting mugged?

@Jav4491: In a word, yes. First Puppy Pads just encourage a dog to pee in that general area…they don’t know that they are supposed to pee ON the pad. I would suggest stop using the puppy pads in the house, they only encourage potty time within the house. Instead put the puppy pads outside to encourage the dog to associate the outside area with potty time.

Also, pomeranians are a bit fickle when it comes to potty training. I have two, I know this well. Some develop nervous “pees” where they only pee a small amount and frequently. It just happens. The best thing to do is establish a feeding schedule and encourage regular opportunities for the puppy to go outside. At 9 weeks puppies cannot hold much in.

My future step-sister in law didn’t train her puppy to go outside and it pees on pads because she finds it inconvenient to take it out. It’s fine for at her apartment, but when it comes with her to Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter, it pees everywhere because it isn’t used to holding it and is just used to using pads. It doesn’t matter that she brings pads with her, in the new environment she misses and goes somewhere else or on a bathmat or something that looks like a pad.

My grandma also trained her puppy to use the pad. She has accidents constantly because she never learned it was wrong to go inside. She also doesn’t understand how to go outside. She’ll go for a walk or play outside and will wait to go back inside to ‘business’. It’s really counterproductive and it makes it horrible if someone has to dog-sit for you.

We lived on the third floor of our building and didn’t have an elevator. We had to use the special ‘dog staircase’ and ‘dog exit’ of our building. I know what you’re going through, but it’s important that you train your puppy properly and start young.

Your puppy is really little and can’t control its pee. It’s bound to miss the pad and honestly the best thing you can do to house train it is to take it outside ALL THE TIME. Scolding it won’t work because it doesn’t understand what its doing yet. You just need to train it to go outside using positive reinforcement.

Think of it this way: short-term pain (read: inconvenience for you) for long-term gain. Pads are a quick fix but aren’t meant to be used forever. If it’s too hard to take your puppy out regularly to train it then maybe you need to rethink this 14+ year commitment you just made 😉

ETA: My future step-sister in law and grandma didn’t mean for pads to be a forever thing. It was more a convenience thing and then they were never able to transition their dogs to go outside once they got used to the pad and peeing inside.

I won’t preach to you about what you should do with your dog. I will suggest Petsmart puppy training classes. They’re $100 and worth EVERY PENNY.

Also, you need to put the pee on the pad. When he pees near it, take the pad and use it to soak up some of the pee. This should direct the dog to pee ON the pad, but as another poster said, the pee pads really only direct them to pee in the vicinity.

@sugarpea: I am in no way an expert, but I have potty trained a lot of dogs, and to further elaborate on your statement, this whole issue happens because the dog has no clear distinction of where “outside” is. Animals will do their business far away from their dens and homes, mostly because they don’t want to attract predators to their home.

This really doesn’t hold water in a domestic environment because they don’t really have predators to worry about. However animals that do not know where “outside” begins and “inside” ends will end up with potty training issues. The issues aren’t because the dog wasnt allowed outside, or it simply had an accident, it’s because the dog thinks that this is where it’s supposed to go. This is further encouraged by scent. Poop and pee will settle into floorboards, carpet & padding. The dog goes, “Ooh! I pee’d here before!” and will pee there again. When it reaches this state, there isn’t much you can do except replace the flooring. Professional cleaners can help, but you’ll never get rid of the smell because they can smell it where you can’t.

You need to clearly define the entire home environment as their den. Doing their business in the den is unacceptable and they need to understand that they can’t do it in their den, the only allowed place is outside. Your home is not “inside”. Waste is never acceptable inside the den, and you need to vehemently encourage the dog to do it outside and learn that the door is the ‘gateway’ to outside.

@Jav4491: your best bet would be frequent trips outside And not out of your sight when inside. I took my dog out every 30-45 min in the beginning. Also, you may need to give him a few weeks. 9w is very young.